ExclusiveChina Halts US Soybean Imports Despite Trade Deal

Welcome to China In Focus. I'm Kevin Hogan in for Tiffany Meyer. Our top story, China's purchases of U.S. soybeans have reportedly stalled just two weeks after Washington and Beijing's trade agreements. What's happening behind the scenes? A half-mile-long bridge in southwest China has collapsed just a couple of months after it opened. It's the third mega-bridge to collapse in China this year. As frustration builds up due to geopolitical tensions, General Motors is asking suppliers to move production out of China. That's according to sources close to the matter. And French families are suing the Chinese-owned app TikTok, claiming its algorithm pushed their children towards suicide. A French court has opened an investigation into the popular short-form video platform. China's purchases of American soybeans has hit a standstill. This comes just two weeks after Beijing agreed to purchase more U.S. agriculture during trade talks with President Trump last month. And on Tuesday, traders told Bloomberg that after a quick burst of orders late last month, Chinese imports of U.S. soybean cargos seem to have stopped. They say no new shipments have been booked, raising doubts about whether Beijing will meet Washington's expectations. The U.S. claims China pledged to buy 12 million tons of soybeans by the end of this year, and 25 million tons annually over the next three years. But traders noticed that Beijing has instead kept up heavy soybean purchases from South America. Brazilian beans are going for about $480 a ton, compared to U.S. cargos at roughly $550 per ton. On top of that, U.S. soybeans still face a 13 percent tariff from China, making them unprofitable for commercial crushers. That's left most of the recent U.S. purchases in the hands of Chinese state-run companies. A U.S. official told Reuters the administration expects China to stick to its commitments. They warned that tariffs could be adjusted if Beijing doesn't follow through. But analysts say there's little sign that Chinese buyers are on track to hit the promised 12 million tons before the end of the year, and they're even less likely to reach 25 million tons next year. A half-mile-long bridge in southwest China has collapsed just a couple of months after it opened. Chinese authorities say a landslide caused the collapse on Tuesday, but many online users remain skeptical. The video of the bridge collapsing first appeared on Chinese social media. Local authorities confirmed the news shortly afterward, saying no casualties were reported. They added that the bridge developed cracks just one day before the collapse. Due to a landslide on a nearby mountainside, the bridge is located in a mountainous area of Sichuan province, right next to a hydropower station and a large reservoir. Some Chinese netizens are questioning why authorities never commented on the bridge's quality. The questions are well-grounded because this isn't the first bridge to collapse in China this year. Back in August, a steel strand failure occurred on a large bridge in China's western province of Qinghai. The bridge, roughly one mile long, was still under construction at the time. At least 12 workers were killed in the accident. And in June, another bridge in southwestern Guizhou province collapsed during heavy rain, leaving a truck hanging over the edge. General Motors wants its parts makers to move their supply chains out of China. That's according to sources close to the matter. It's a sign of the automakers' frustration with geopolitical disruptions to their operations. The sources said the US auto major has told several thousand of its suppliers to entirely clear their supply chains of parts from the country. They further added the automaker has given some suppliers a two-year deadline to end their China sourcing ties. GM is said to have approached some suppliers with the directive late last year. But the move took on more urgency more recently due to the escalating US-China trade battle. The sources added GM executives have said it's part of a wider strategy to improve the company's supply chain resiliency. Geopolitical tensions between the two superpowers have loomed over carmakers this year. President Donald Trump's tariffs have made auto companies reassess their ties to China, while they also have concerns over potential rare earth bottlenecks and computer chip shortages. China has long been an important source of parts and raw materials. The GM effort targets parts and materials that go into cars built in North America, according to the sources. The automaker had already been among the most active car companies to try and lower their reliance on China for battery materials and computer chips. It's partnered with a US-based rare earths company and invested in a lithium mine in Nevada for future electric vehicle battery materials. A GM spokesperson declined to comment. Last month, GM CEO Mary Barra described efforts to move more of the company's supply chain to the US. While several major countries in Europe take a tougher stance on China, Spain is moving in the opposite direction. For the first time in almost two decades, the Spanish monarch paid a visit to Beijing, signing a series of trade deals. During his trip Wednesday, King Felipe met with Chinese leader Xi Jinping, looking to strengthen cooperation between the two nations. They oversaw the signing of 10 agreements, ranging from agriculture to space and astronomy. On top of that, Chinese Premier Li Qiang pushed for more Chinese investment in Spain, such as solar, hydrogen and power batteries. Spain, who's one of Europe's top pork-kicks hoarders, is facing challenges with trade tensions between the European Union and China. Last September, China slapped tariffs of over 60% on EU pork. Despite that, Spain still sells about $1.2 billion worth of meat to China each year. Notably, Spain imports far more from China than it exports. In 2024, the country imported $52 billion worth of Chinese goods, compared to $8.6 billion in exports. The visit underscores Spain's balancing act, boosting ties with China while navigating EU pushback over Beijing's unjust trade practices. Former senior New York State government employee Linda Sun is standing on trial this week, alongside her husband, Chris Hu. The U.S. federal government is charging the couple with a total of 19 counts. In Wednesday's opening statement, a prosecutor described the case as one of betrayal and greed by a senior official that benefited the Chinese regime. To many, Linda Sun seemed to have it all, until she went on trial and risked losing everything. Between 2015 and 2023, she served as former New York Governor Cuomo's senior aide, and later as Governor Hochul's deputy chief of staff, managing Asia-related affairs. Her husband, an America-born Chinese citizen, Chris Hu, also has businesses in mainland China and New York City. Together, they own properties worth millions in New York and Hawaii. But everything changed when federal agents arrested the couple last year. The government says Linda Sun betrayed her duties as a government employee and used her position to benefit the Chinese regime and enrich herself. Several examples the government listed were highlighted. Sun blocked Taiwanese officials from meeting with New York Governor and Lieutenant Governor. She also secretly added Chinese consulate officials to an internal phone call. On top of that, Sun forged Governor Hochul's signature to bring Chinese nationals into New York City. Meanwhile, Chris Hu is accused of exploiting his wife's position for his business opportunities in China in exchange for huge profits. He then allegedly hid that wealth with bank fraud, money laundering, and tax evasion. The government also accuses the couple of betraying New York residents when COVID-19 pandemic began surging in 2020. It says Sun helped her Chinese cousin's company secure federal contracts for purchasing personal protection equipment like masks and medical gloves. While millions of people's lives were at stake, Sun and her family made millions through these deals, all while lying to the New York government. The government accuses the two of receiving millions of dollars in kickbacks from the Chinese regime through their schemes. Linda Sun's attorney dismissed these accusations, saying Sun was just doing her job and claims she is not an agent for China. The trial is estimated to last for three to four weeks. Now over to France, where a court has opened a criminal probe into TikTok after allegations that its algorithm pushed minors towards suicide. The case follows multiple family lawsuits and a scathing parliamentary report calling the app a dangerous algorithmic trap. And to the international correspondent, David Vives reports from Paris. France's justice system has opened a preliminary investigation into social media giant TikTok following concerns that its algorithm could push minors towards suicide. These follow recent cases of teenagers who committed suicide across the country and a lawsuit filed by seven families accusing TikTok of exposing their children to content that encouraged self-harm. The commission heard from over 170 experts and received 30,000 testimonies from the public. One teenager testified before lawmakers. At first, I saw videos about art and music, but soon everything turned darker. I fell into a harmful loop. Investigators are now examining several potential offenses, including the promotion of methods for taking one's own life. A TikTok spokesperson told Reuters that the Chinese company categorically rejects what it calls the commission's misleading presentation. French lawmakers have been scrutinizing TikTok for years. In 2023, former Senator André Gatolin contributed to a report on the platform. He says there are signs that the Chinese Communist Party may use TikTok as a tool in its warfare operations. Generally speaking, social networks like Facebook and others become profitable fairly quickly, turning a profit after four, five or six years. TikTok, through Binance, has been around for many years, and they have more expenses than they have resources. They don't sell personal data, and for good reason. They don't market it because the destination is the Chinese regime, the Chinese Communist Party, which means filing as many people as possible. So the driving idea behind TikTok is not that TikTok should become a leader in its sector according to the accepted rules of international trade or capitalism, so to speak. The idea is to introduce a quasi-military offensive dimension, which could be described as hybrid warfare, in order to truly undermine the integrity and unity of a nation. In July, TikTok was fined $615 million by an EU agency after an Irish court found that users' data was accessible from China and insufficiently protected. Gatolin says this mass data collection effectively weaponizes TikTok against its users. We know there's a massive collection of data. It's a way of gaining control over the future of our societies, and that's extremely serious. TikTok said that there is no data transfer, but we have seen in investigations that there were Chinese computer scientists from ByteDance who broke into the app and then transferred data and stole it. You know, all these systems are called backdoors, and so if you leave the door open, you can't say that this is a robbery, I guess. A parliamentary report published in September 2025 recommended the ban of TikTok for teenagers younger than 15 years old. David Vives, NTD News, Paris. A TikTok spokesperson told Reuters the company invests heavily in providing age-appropriate experiences for teens. They say the company offers over 50 features to support teen well-being and removes nine out of 10 videos that violate its rules before anyone sees them. And coming up, Beijing made several promises to curb exports of fentanyl precursors and purchase more U.S. agricultural goods. But will China follow through? Riley Walters, senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, breaks it down. And Beijing is putting in more effort to gather intel at U.S. military bases. The head of the Michigan National Guard testified to that before state lawmakers. More on that after the break, here on China In Focus. Welcome back to China In Focus. I'm Kevin Hogan. As China introduces export controls on drug precursors, how confident can the U.S. be that China will uphold the recent trade deal? To discuss, NTD's Jack Bradley was joined by Riley Walters, senior fellow at the Hudson Institute. Riley Walters, thank you so much for joining us here today. Yeah, pleasure. Thanks for having me. Now, China's shipments to the U.S. have fallen by double digits for the last seven consecutive months. What's the current state of China's economy? Well, I think there's two parts to this. There's what China is doing with the United States, and then there's what China is doing with the rest of the world. And so I think there's an argument to be made that whatever China is not shipping to the United States, they're shipping to the rest of the world. And so domestically, the economy in China is kind of in this malaise. Consumer confidence is real low. Investment spending is particularly sluggish. It's really deflationary, in fact. And so they're trying to look at how to export all this manufacturing that they have. And since the United States has all these higher tariffs than other countries at this point, they're really taking advantage of emerging markets. Southeast Asia in particular has been actually quite struggling with the exports coming from China. It's a real problem for them. And when you say that China is in a deflation right now, what's that like for the average Chinese citizen? Again, consumer confidence is just at a particularly low point. People don't really want to spend money. Wages aren't particularly rising, so that doesn't help. The things that they've invested in, like the property sector, they're not really getting returns on a lot of their investment. And so it's what do you do when you have really no growth going on? You can't spend it on particularly luxurious goods. Maybe some services, maybe you go out. But even then, if there's no confidence there, people just don't want to spend money. And when asked about de-risking from China, moving the U.S. completely away even from China's economy, the China hawk Gordon Chang said that it'll probably take about half a decade before we can be completely independent from China. What's your take on that timeline? I don't want to comment on timelines, because there's actually two parts of that. It's what the United States wants to do, and there's what China wants to do. China's been trying to decouple from the United States for a decade already. So if another five years is enough to get that done, I don't know. Maybe it'll take 10, maybe it'll take 20. But the Chinese themselves are actually quite expeditious in making sure that they aren't reliant on the U.S. economy any more that we are than them. In fact, they're much better at decoupling from the United States than we are from them. And so what does it mean to de-risk, decouple completely? We'll see. But I think this administration is very interested in reducing its reliance. It does want to, you know, reshore a lot of manufacturing, or at least have friends and allies do a lot of that lifting instead of relying on China, particularly for critical minerals and other sensitive things that could potentially put the United States at risk. And so with this recent deal between the U.S. and China on trade, part of it comes down to lowering tariffs for China, their promise to crack down on fentanyl. Now we know a House Select Committee on the CCP report from last April found that the Chinese Communist Party is directly subsidizing the export and manufacture of fentanyl precursor chemicals, making their way to the U.S. China just now put 13 of these precursor chemicals on the export restriction list. Do you see that as a sign of this deal working out? You could say that. Yeah, I think there's a lot of interest on both sides to maintain whatever Trump and Xi Jinping negotiated in South Korea. You know, the precursor thing, China could handle this years ago if they really wanted to. And even looking forward, going ahead, I think there should be a lot of skepticism in what China announces because as the old adage goes, trust but verify. You can believe what they're saying, but if we don't actually see it, then the whole deal is just out of the window. I do think that both sides have been talking about pausing a lot of the restrictions that they've announced or plans to impose new restrictions. They've been putting those on hold, and they plan to do that for the next 12 months. Again, we'll see if things can actually stay steady. Again, politics might change a lot of that. I think the Chinese economy at this point is still somewhat reliant on the United States, you know, not to contradict what I was saying earlier, but there's still an interest to maintain some level of economic business between the United States and China from both Chinese side and the American side. And so whether the deal can hold up or not, that's a different question. I think they are trying, at least at this point, to have a deal that has a little bit more shelf life on it than, you know, just a month or two months. Recently in a meeting with President Trump, Japan's Prime Minister, Takaichi, said that she's willing to raise the defense spending of the country to 2% of their GDP by March, way earlier than initially expected. What could this mean to the CCP, seeing how the CCP has been increasingly aggressive in that region? It's not just Japan. It's a lot of countries in the region. I think they're being very proactive in supporting their own defense interests, which is great. When we're talking about U.S. alliances, this is what the United States really wants to see, not just what the countries themselves want to see it, but we want to see them take up more responsibility in their own defense. And Japan is doing that. I mean, they are, like you said, actively spending much more and looking at different systems that really help their defense and security interests. And Michigan lawmakers are uncovering more evidence regarding the Chinese regime's efforts to take photos and gather intel at U.S. military bases. The head of the Michigan National Guard testified before state lawmakers last week about the practice. People's Republic of China are very active in their information gathering, intelligence collection. Really, you see it through businesses, you see it through military sites, training. It's not uncommon. It's actually, I'd almost say it's pretty routine for Chinese nationals, PRC, People's Republic of China nationals, to be tasked to go somewhere and actively try to get onto a base, a military base, try to gain entry into a restricted area. And if they get entry to collect certain pieces of information, whatever it may be of interest, but it's fairly routine and well-established that this is an active, ongoing. Major General Paul Rogers pointed to an incident in 2023. The military found five Chinese nationals taking photos in classified military equipment inside Camp Grayling in northern Michigan. That's the training facility for the Michigan Army National Guard. This led to an FBI investigation. The five were identified as Chinese students at the Michigan University, but they all managed to flee the U.S. to avoid arrest. The general warns that this is not an isolated incident and it's been happening everywhere. A year ago, we had two individuals show up at the gate at Selfridge Air National Guard Base. They wanted to go and visit the museum and they were both PRC nationals and they got turned away by the guards there because they're not allowed to have access. That alone is like, okay, well, that could happen, you know, if somebody likes military aircraft and they want to show up somewhere. But the fact that those same two individuals showed up three days later at the same gate hoping to find a guard that would not be doing their due diligence and tried to gain access again using the exact same excuse. It's a constant probing. Yeah. And it's a little cat and mouse and they're not breaking any laws, right? So there's nothing that can be done about it, but you know, it's not with good intent. According to the Justice Department, back in 2023, Chinese nationals were sentenced to prison for illegally taking photos inside the U.S. Naval Air Station in Key West, Florida. Notably, two of them were also students at the University of Michigan. And Thailand has extradited a Chinese gambling kingpin and owner of a scam city to China on Wednesday. He's been accused of running online gambling sites and cyber scams in Cambodia and Burma, also known as Myanmar. The man, She Zhi Jiang, developed Burma's Yatai New City as a place the U.S. Treasury Department called notorious for gambling, drug trafficking, prostitution and scams targeting people around the world, particularly Americans. He was arrested by Thai police in August, 2022. Thai police say he is set to stand trial in China. The United States imposed sanctions against She Zhi Jiang in September. He previously said his prosecution is politically motivated, alleging involvement by Chinese state security. Sources told the Epoch Times that he was once recruited by the Chinese Communist Party for overseas projects, but later fell out with Beijing after resisting efforts to seize control of his Yatai project in Burma. And that's all for today's China In Focus. I'm Kevin Hogan, in for Tiffany Meyer. If you have any feedback on the show or have something you'd like to see us cover, send us an email at chinainfocusatntd.com. And for round-the-clock original news coverage, visit us at ntd.com or download our NTD app. Thanks for watching. See you soon.